NBN Fibre-To-The-Building Delayed

The NBN's fibre to the basement/building (FTTB) service was tipped to roll out in 2014, but a roadmap released on Tuesday by NBN Co shows the date has now been pushed back to Q1 2015.

'Processes and systems for the release of Fibre to the Building Services,' has now been pushed back until Q1 2015, the July roadmap indicates. FTTB delivers fibre optic cables to a telecommunications box (or node) which is ordinarily located in the communications room of the building. This box, in turn, connects to the existing in-building wiring, enabling ISPs to deliver fast broadband to each individual apartment and office.

Some testing of the FTTB product will be carried out in Q4 this year, prior to deployment in 2015. The NBN Co are continuing an FTTB pilot in inner-city Melbourne suburbs and are currently measuring the user experience of those who signed-up.

In April, NBN Co. Chief Bill Murrow announced the fttb NBN services would be deployed sooner than expected in 2014, in response to competition for 'high-value customers' from TPG, who is building its own network and plans to connect fibre to the basement services (fttb) to 500,000 apartments.

Sydney's Haymarket, New Farm and Fortitude Valley in Brisbane and South Melbourne were among the areas earmarked by the NBN for very fast broadband to apartments and office buildings. But now, it seems these NBN customers will have to wait a little longer.

An NBN Co spokesperson said:

"This continues our progress in delivering the NBN faster and more affordably by using a variety of technologies. We expect to offer the FTTB product to service providers for testing from October 2014 with the aim of releasing a commercially available product in early 2015. "

"The Integrated Product Roadmap is a current reflection of our estimated timeframe to deliver these services at the time it is published. Timelines are subject to revision as product development proceeds and matures."

Preliminary tests of the technology in December 2013 produced download speeds of more than 100 Mbps and upload speeds of more than 40 Mbps.

There is no further update on the timing of Fibre-to-the-Node (FTTN) or HFC products.